February 29

There are things we feel we must have in life. We need a roof over our heads, we need viable work to do, we must have food to sustain our bodies, we yearn for meaningful relationships with other people. But when we’ve attained our fine home because we’ve distinguished ourselves at our work, and the food of our table is more than enough to sustain life and we have forged friendships and associations and romances that satisfy, what do we yet lack?

We know we lack something because like the Israelites who wandered in the wilderness for forty years because they could not stay on the straight path to the Promised Land, we, too, find ourselves floundering through an aimless abyss. Even though they had manna to eat and even though we are rich and full, we still have an insatiable longing within that nothing seems able to satisfy.

Jesus addressed this very situation in John 6:32 when He said, “Verily, verily I say to you, Moses did not give you manna from Heaven, but it was My Father. It is He who gives you the true Bread of Heaven.” What is this “true Bread of Heaven” that is supplied by our Heavenly Father? What is it that can sustain life when all we endeavor to achieve and to possess leaves us feeling empty and unfulfilled?

Of course, the answer is that it is Jesus Himself who is our Bread of Life. It is only Jesus who can satisfy the inner longing of our hearts and spirits. It is only Jesus who can nurture our inner man so that no matter how the outer man may succumb to the ravages of hatred or war or simply old age, the part of us that is to be alive for evermore will be sustained and transported safely to its eternal reward.